Sunday, 12 October 2014

Police Cock-ups Part Two.

I just a
day or two ago finished highlighting the strange and odd behaviour of our
police force these days. The latest stuff up has finally been revealed
regarding a seven year old absolute cock up by our so-called investigators who
wear blue and called themselves, perhaps incorrectly, investigative policeman.
Firstly its true policemen and women are human beings, and because human beings
make mistakes, it’s not only understandable that mistakes will be made, or
errors occur in the day to day running of a police force. What is not
acceptable is the planned manipulation and the withholding of evidence that
corrupt the actual functioning of justice. This latest revelation must lead to
an ever-increasingly concerned and anxious general public when one considers
that the PM only today is talking about giving our police and security people
more and greater power to detain and arrest people before they have even committed
a crime of any nature. The way our police hide their cock-ups, sins, crimes
puts them into the same league as US State and City Police forces who seem to
be able to do what they like, to whoever they like, and especially if the
so-called baddies are young, Black Americans or Hispanic or especially these
days Arab of any nature, Muslim or otherwise.

Here is the
detail of the latest cock-up to see the light of day…because a Judge spoke out
and revealed the almost total incompetence of a bunch of Tauranga policemen.

Since this
comic book stuff up actually happened believe it or not, SEVEN years ago I
suppose that the police involved have since been promoted and now hold senior
positions, or have been praised at their retirement function or their departure
to other professions as “Good honest first class detectives, as was the cop who
planted the evidence in the now infamous Allan Arthur Thomas case.

“3 News can reveal
police were told to sort out the way they deal with witnesses and informants,
after a murder trial ended with three men acquitted, and the judge expressing
alarm. As a result of the William Taikato case, the Independent Police Conduct
Authority (IPCA) recommended a number of changes some might be surprised
weren't already in place.

Taikato's whanau admit
he was no angel, but his sister Katrina says he didn't deserve such a hellish
end. "He was an awesome father, he loved his kids," she said.

Taikato was caught up in
the Tauranga drug scene in its P-producing, violence-fueled prime. The court
heard he was shot dead, fed through a tree mulcher and doused with acid.

Seven years on and
there's been no justice for his family, with all three men brought to trial in
2011 acquitted.

"The witnesses'
stories didn't add up - they were changing - and police didn't have reports at
the time,” Ms Taikato said. She does not think police had the case under
control.

Justice Joe Williams
didn't mince his words either, first saying there was "insufficient
reliable evidence" to convict Mark Puata, John Aitken and David Anderson.

Then, in a later judgement
said there was "unquestionably a pattern" that appeared to involve
"potentially serious impropriety" by one or more senior officers.

Despite that, no action was taken against any
individual staff. The IPCA did investigate police management of the prosecution
after a complaint was made, but those findings were never made public until
now.

Documents released under
the Official Information Act make for surprising reading.

Surprising because the
changes required and recommended might seem like common sense, such as better management of witnesses and
informants, ring-fencing staff so those involved at the start saw it
through to the finish and regular reviews by the officer in charge.

Police wouldn't be
interviewed about the IPCA's investigation.

"I
think at the end of the day they just wanted it swept under the carpet and, I
mean, it's been seven years now and we still have not heard anything," Ms
Taikato says.

The Taikato murder case
remains open, and Ms Taikato remains without answers or the chance to give her
brother a proper tangi.

Yet another case
of police odd behaviour came to light this week…this to makes interesting
reading. This has only been hidden for almost four years…

“Waikato
police covered up the existence of a corrupt cop who stole drugs from an police
station evidence safe.

The
theft is believed to be the reason a Black Power gang member changed his guilty
plea in a drugs case in 2011.

But
it was only after the Waikato Times approached police following a three-month
investigation that Waikato police district commander superintendent Bruce Bird
last week admitted the incident occurred.

The
theft involved up to $5000 of methamphetamine (P) which went missing from a
police evidence safe at Huntly Police Station between June 2010 and January
2011.

Hamilton
CIB was ultimately informed of the theft which led to a full-scale
investigation involving a dozen investigators and lasting four months.

The
Waikato incident comes after reports that four police officers, including a
Canterbury area commander, and a former constable, are under criminal
investigation for their part in presenting false evidence in a separate case in
Timaru.

More
than 70 officers - past and present - were interviewed from Huntly and
Ngaruawahia police stations in the Waikato incident. No one was charged, the
case remains unsolved and the police officer involved may well be still serving
on the force.

The
failure of police authorities to be open about what occurred at the time
angered a police source who said it was hushed up to protect the police's
reputation.

"If
they had come out and said ‘hey, guys, some of the drugs we confiscated from
the baddies have been stolen by one of our officers', it would have blown up in
the media. They dealt with it in-house to protect face."

The
theft was discovered after two senior officers conducted an audit of the
evidence safe in January 2011 and found that P confiscated from Black Power
member Jacob Phillips was missing. The gangster was stopped in June 2010 by a
routine police patrol.

Officers
found a mobile clandestine P lab operating out of his car along with five grams
of P, a Class A drug, valued at up to $5,000.

Two
weeks after the theft was discovered, Phillips changed his plea from guilty to
not guilty and Huntly police alerted Hamilton police to the theft.

Another
police source recalled how the gang member's change of plea was a sign of
something sinister. "When I heard he went with ‘not guilty,' that's when I
knew we had a rat amongst us.

"[The
offender] must have known the drugs were gone. We had no leg to stand on if
this went to trial."

Phillips
was jailed in December last year for what are believed to be other offences.

"If
this had gone to trial, we would have had to go public that the drugs were
stolen. Maybe it was divine intervention or he could have been told to run by
the rat? We don't know."

Sources
within the force said there were strict protocols around evidence safes.

Talk
at the time among staff was that two officers should have been considered suspects,
but it is unknown if they were ever officially suspects. ‘They couldn't pin it
on either of them. There was no evidence, just strong suspicion."

So is this yet
another couple of events to be added to the ever growing number of strange and
weird events that have been brought about by our strange and what seems
uncontrollable police force.

Maybe this is the reason why the PM keeps appointing a yes person to the role of Minister of Police...as he has just done yet again...